Nigel rises again- Is this the second coming?

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/health/familyhealth/%c2%a3150m-for-eating-disorder-children/ar-BBgehlO?ocid=iehp

I don’t know why this lot don’t simply go now, talk about totally out of touch, the man’s a knob.

‘Resigned!’ – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30473388

Ah! Perhaps you should have clarified in your earlier post that you were referring to “left of centre” fora elsewhere!!

Public and political opinion is not restricted to this forum, I would be amazed if the BBC was accused of right wing prejudice on this forum, however look around a little there are plenty of forums who are rather more to the left of centre, not surprisingly in their view the BBC is biased to the right and the establishment.

Personally I still feel that the BBC is more neutral than most if not all the assorted media.

According to this report someone is now sorry and was receiving medication http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30467897

SF – who has made that accusation? I have simply accused it of being a piece of second rate entertainment masquerading as an intelligent debating programme.

Silver Fox

That is a first for me ! In sixty years of Beeb watching I’ve never known it to be accused of ‘right wing prejudice’ or, ‘favouring the establishment’. Altho’ if there was any doubt about the latter, I might possibly be convinced.

Re 405

Correct in every detail and the reason I stopped viewing; that, plus an insane urge to murder the telly.

Oh dear, amazing how often the BBC is equally accused of right wing prejudice and favouring the “establishment”, must be getting it reasonably right.

In what way ??

In the way that according to both public criticism and that of a very close relative of mine who does watch it regularly, the audience adds little or nothing to the programme other than cheap entertainment value, detracting from the panelists being employed to discuss the topics. They often appear to be “planted” to achieve what the producers of the programme desire. And to reiterate, this was the main reason I stopped watching it. You hope for intelligent debate in programmes of this nature but sadly they have, for the large part, become wholly politicised and end up being cheap point scoring, crowd-pleasers.

“….I wonder why…”

Matching left wing credentials, that’s why. They all play for the same team: Champagne Socialists United.

Do you who endured the programme share the general criticism of the audience and its participation? .

In what way ? I think there were those who didn’t like being preached to, and weren’t afraid to speak out.
I don’t very often watch the programme myself now, and only watched this one because of who was on the panel.

As others have said. How much longer can the BBC pretend that the panel don’t know the questions that are going to
be put to them ?

The BBC also seem to have a love affair with Russell Brand, I wonder why ?

With a First Class degree from Brasenose Oxford I am not surprised – someone with a bit of intellectual clout! Do you who endured the programme share the general criticism of the audience and its participation? One of the main reasons I gave up watching ages ago. It would surely be a better programme without an audience.

I thought Camilla Cavendish made the most consistently intelligent comments of the night

Indeed Meddle, thought the same. Unfortunately her words of wisdom were lost in the Brand/Farage show.

I think we probably agree generally but disagree about the detail.

But if state education actually worked to the full benefit of teachers and pupils your problem of one size not fitting all would not apply.

There is a high mountain to climb and I doubt it will be conquered in my lifetime. In yours perhaps but I am not optimistic. I remain unconvinced that the bureaucrats and unions will cede power and responsibility to those who actually should be running the show. By sacking Gove I think Cameron has sent quite the wrong message.

But we shall see – I hope I am proved wrong.

Last point first.

No question that the system collapsed. Throughout much of the 80s and 90s it was pretty awful. The big issue is one of how to turn it round.

My own experience is based on work in a county which has been widely and comprehensively criticised by Ofsted, and by system leaders. It would be fair to say that I am in a fortunate position, as are my children. However, it does demonstrate, that in a sea of poorer performance, some schools can and do stand out. As a small school, we have classes of mixed age, and mixed ability. For our most recent results, those that were published on Thursday, our results showed a good spread from just below the expected grade to way above it. All of those children were educated in the same class for their final year, so it shows it can be done.

The new curriculum moves away from grading, and towards progress, which may be a better indicator of a childs performance. Thus they will not be graded by Level, but by how far they have come. It’s a step change, and one that will be difficult to implement, but time will tell how it works.

Our school has no issue with discipline. Bad discipline is a failure of leadership. Our local secondary academy does have an issue with it, and I will not be sending my children there. The other local one, about two miles further distant, the other way, has no problem. There are solutions out there, but the will is needed to implement them, and that must come from the governing body, and from the head.

Interesting point on use of the state sector. We have a new free school/academy just opened in Norwich. Lots of fanfare, uses an old retired office building they are slowly converting to purpose. All the indications are that it will offer a very high standard of education. At the open evening I attended it was interesting to see who the prospective pupils might be. All of the parents were highly aspirational, and many of them would be looking at paying elsewhere. Frustratingly, we live just too far away from it, and are unlikely to be able to benefit. Regardless of who attends, it is open to all.

I think the ultimate problem is there is no one size fits all solution. Grammar schools might suit one part of the population, but a problem remains.

Bruce

Interesting points, Bruce.

I am not sure that I would agree with your first point based on my experience locally with three people involved in education – two teaching and one in administration. So I suppose all we can learn from our experience is just how uneven educational performance is.

My reading of the problem is similar to yours, but from a different perspective. I believe there are far too many “stakeholders”, to use that ghastly Blairism, involved in education – you have succinctly named a few. I would scrap Ofsted, one of the bonfire of Quangos which was never lit, and I would scrap targets to a great extent. In fact much of the problem in education is that teachers are required to spend far too much time analysing and reporting instead of teaching. And teachers and the Headmaster or Headmistress should indeed take responsibility for their failures where they exist. The running of schools should be in the hands of the head, aided, abetted and supported by the School Board of Governors. And one fundemental element HAS to return to school life. Discipline. School children are not “students”, they are children. The relationship between pupils and teachers has broken down so much in so many schools because it is wrongly perceived and lacks discipline. And parents have far too much influence in the day to day affairs of the school.

I do not follow your last point. Life is full of tests and exams of one kind or another. If, as we agree, the comprehensive sector has to pull itself up by its bootstraps and match grammar school performance then the problem will not arise, anyway. And the grammar school subject is somewhat of a red herring because so few remain with little prospect of new ones opening. I am sure that many families who privately educate their children would gladly transfer them to the state sector if a similar education was on offer.

My mother spent her working life teaching, finally retiring as Deputy Head from a large comprehensive. She lived through the system from pre 1944 Act and beyond the 1976 Act. And she ended up dispirited by the journey. Not for any nostalgia but because she fervently felt the new and evolving system was letting children and teachers down, badly. After retirement she kept in close touch with ex-colleagues and ex-pupils and before she died just short of her century she remained of that view.

Hi Charlie,

Again, my own experience suggests it is perfectly possible to give the best the encouragement and nurture they deserve and give those with less aptitude the support they need – at the same time.

I was thinking about this earlier – one of our biggest problems is the blame culture we inhabit, and the fact that people will NOT take responsibility. When there are two schools in the same general area, and one is good and one is poor, then there is likely to be a failure of leadership somewhere. However, all we hear is that is the local authorities fault, Ofsteds fault, or the governments fault. What we must do is get to a system where the poorer schools are given appropriate targeted support to improve. That is some of the aim of the academy programme, though that has its faults.

The fact that we must not aim for second best fundamentally rules out a return to grammar schools IMHO. There are plenty of kids who do not start to shine until they are in secondary education. By not passing a test, they would be lost.

Bruce

Bruce

I don’t think I do but fear that the emphasis is on making sure that the those of the poorest aptitude are given the best chances at the expense of the talented and bright who need all the support and encouragement the schools can offer. I accept exceptions will always prove the rule and admire your own successes. But we need EVERY school to be as good as the best and none to settle for second best.

I was also going to write in support of your last paragraph in your previous post. I was there and I was also sentient more than a decade before that. In many ways the country is better than it was but in a few we have made no progress, socially.

Paul I think you misunderstand the problem in your last sentence. If the comprehensive system had worked the demand for selective and private education would have diminished. The current system aspires to the lowest common denominator instead of a system which aspires to create the best in everything. ( By the way there has to be a better role model for a comprehensive education than Alan Sugar, doesn’t there?!!!)

Accept that the world comprises the brilliant and the ordinary. Make the resources available for the brilliant while giving the ordinary the best opportunites to make the best of their lives. And picking up your earlier point scrap half the universities and courses and return to a mix of universities and polytechnics.

Charlie,

I don’t disagree with a lot of this, but you too misunderstand the system. Getting the best from every child is at the heart of the ideal, and natural selection will always come into play, but we mustn’t write off kids based on their background. The system can and does work if applied correctly, and there are a lot of brilliant practitioners out there. Teaching standards are improving, and poor teaching is much less frequent than it was.

I am lucky, my daughters have two outstanding teachers, both of whom are relatively new to the profession. My hope for the future is that there will be more like than, who can inspire future generations, and give them the tools to succeed.

Bruce